Delighted to welcome back memoir author Sherri Matthews with four posts sharing her experiences of childhood and teens and living in the UK after many years in California. In the final post this series Sherri takes us on a holiday to the Norfolk Broads, a fabulous boating holiday, and an introduction to the more ghostly side of this idyllic part of the country.

Holiday Reading, Ghosts And The Norfolk Broads

Holiday reading. What beats a book crammed full of twists and turn, thrills and spills to keep us occupied while lazing on the beach or reclining on a deck chair by the side of a pool somewhere hot and Mediterranean? What indeed!

When Lisa set her prompt for this week’s Bite Size Memoir challenge as ‘Holiday Reads’ my memories took me not to the beach or the pool but back to the annual holidays we took as a family when I was a girl to the tranquility of the Norfolk Broads

A boating holiday is certainly not relaxing in the usual sense, particularly if sailing. In fact, it is quite physical with all the leaping on and off boats, mooring up, gathering in the sails and generally messing about on the river. Not to mention all those misadventures that seem to go hand-in-hand when on the water, and I’m not just talking about losing one’s sunglasses.

Yet, nothing beats that feeling at the end of a boating day when you are moored up and hunkered down for the night, huddled in your bunk and settling in to your summer read.

Our holidays began with a several hour’s-long drive from Surrey to Norfolk, this being the 1970’s and motorways not what they are today, but oh the joy as we pulled in at last to the narrow roads of the delightfully historic Norfolk village of Horning and headed straight to the boatyard.

There we would set eyes on what would be our holiday home for the next two weeks and so the exodus began of transferring all our luggage, equipment and food from the overflowing car to our boat. Then finding a home for everything, which on a boat is often far from easy.

One year, when I was about twelve, as we took a walk down to the local shops of Horning to gather up some last-minute necessities before heading out, I treated myself to my summer book: it was called Ghosts of the Broads by Charles Sampson

What captured my attention was that there was a ghost story for most of the places we would be visiting so I could time my stories when we were at the actual location. I couldn’t wait!

Some of the stories went on a bit, but there I would be, in the dead of the night, lulled by the gentle motion of our boat to the passing current of the waters surrounding us, my little overhead lamp burning the midnight oil, scaring myself witless.

Approaching from the narrow and meandering River Ant as it merges into the strong currents of the River Bure, the sight of St. Benet’s Abbey looming up at the river’s edge of this convergence always struck a sense of foreboding into my heart as a child.

St Benet’s Abbey, Norfolk Broads (c) Sherri Matthews 2013

I came to learn that it was a monastery founded in Anglo-Saxon times and the only one which went on to function well into the medieval ages. A wind pump was built into the gate of the ruins left behind. Hence the unusual structure.

Visiting the ruins today, my imagination still runs riot but I will write about this at another time, taking up a post of its own as it merits!

The ghosts of the Norfolk Broads and I go back a long way. They have fascinated and enthralled me for as long as I can remember. So it was, that fifteen years ago and after a gap of many years, I was fortunate enough to take my three children on a Norfolk Broad’s holiday, together with my mum, brother and his family. Eleven of us on two boats!

We cruised and sailed for two glorious weeks in August and it was steaming hot every day. Sometimes things work out better than planned and this was no exception.

As ever, I took my ‘Ghosts of the Broads’ book with me. To my amazement, I soon discovered that the very night we found ourselves mooring up for the night on Barton Broad (a huge expanse of water which, you might be interested to know, Admiral Horatio Nelson himself learnt to sail on as a boy) happened to be the same night that one of these ghostly apparitions was to appear.

If the conditions are perfect, the face of a woman appears in the lake, so the story goes. You can imagine, out there alone on the water with nothing but our ghost stories and hyped up children to tell them to, just what the atmosphere must have been like!

In all my years of ‘ghost hunting’ on the Norfolk Broads, I never did see a ghost, which disappointed me greatly and caused me great relief all at the same time. Quite what I would have done if I had found one of ‘my’ ghosts, I will never know.

However, on this particular night something extraordinary did happen, something that neither I nor my family can explain to this day.

South Walsham Broad at dusk – Norfolk Broads(Not having one handy of Barton Broad, but it sets the scene!) (c) Sherri Matthews 2013

Here then is my ‘bite’ for this week, in 150 words exactly:

Moored up in a cosy inlet, the winds that earlier had provided a full day’s sailing had died to a breath and Barton Broad lay as smooth as glass.

Orange skies darkened and a light mist danced across the waters. Conversation and laughter echoed beyond the riverbanks, then silence.

I don’t know who saw it first, but in seconds we were all standing on the gunwale, watching.

It was almost dark now, no wind and boating after sunset was forbidden, if not impossible without navigation lights.

A yacht, in full sail as the waters lapped at its bow, forged ahead in the darkness, the moon giving the merest hint of reflection in the water. No helmsman in sight, yet the sails billowed.

We gaped in hushed disbelief, not comprehending this eerie encounter. Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, the yacht vanished, swallowed up by the mist.

Just like that.

A very eerie note to end on… my thanks to Sherri for sharing another wonderful post with us… I have been on the broads and it is a great holiday… spooky apparitions aside…

While bringing her memoir, Stranger in a White Dress, to publication, Sherri is published in magazines and anthologies. Blogging at her summerhouse, Sherri writes from her life as a Brit mum of three twenty years in California, her misadventures with her jailbird dad, and as Mum and carer to her adult, Aspie youngest. As in life, telling the story one word, one day at a time, Sherri believes that memoir brings alive the past, makes sense of the present and gives hope for the future. Today, Sherri lives in England with her hubby, Aspie and menagerie of pets fondly called, ‘Animal Farm’ and advocates that laughter is indeed the best medicine

Memoir Book Blurb

Stranger In A White Dress

‘We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned,so as to have the life that is waiting for us.’~E. M. Forster~

Set against the backdrop of the late 1970s, the story of a chance meeting one summer’s night between two eighteen year olds unfolds: Sherri, an English girl living in rural Suffolk, and Jonathan (Jon), an American G. I. from California newly posted to a USAF base nearby.

They fall in love fast, but Sherri, delighted to show off her homeland to this “new boy”, soon discovers that although growing up thousands of miles apart, they share dark similarities, which quickly threaten to unravel their relationship.

Their mothers divorced from alcoholic fathers, both were raised by abusive step-fathers. Jon’s increasing drug use and resulting paranoia clash with Sherri’s insecurities as hopes of “fixing” him and of the stable family life she dreams of slip away.

Los Angeles and lust; obsession and rage; passion and the power of love: theirs is a love affair defined by break-ups and make-ups, and then a shattering revelation explodes into this already volatile mix, altering the course of both their lives profoundly and forever.

A tale of darkest tragedy, yet dotted with moments of hilarity and at times the utterly absurd, this is a story of two young people who refuse to give up, believing their love will overcome all.

Not until decades after their chance meeting, and during a return trip to Los Angeles in 2013, does Sherri discover that Jon’s last wish has been granted.

It’s then that she knows the time has come to tell her story.

Sherri’s Memoir is in the final stages of editing and will be available later this year.

Here are the anthologies that Sherri has contributed to. Click the covers to buy.

About Smorgasbord - Variety is the Spice of Life.

My name is Sally Cronin and I am doing what I love.. Writing. Books, short stories, Haiku and blog posts. My previous jobs are only relevant in as much as they have gifted me with a wonderful filing cabinet of memories and experiences which are very useful when putting pen to paper. I move between non-fiction health books and posts and fairy stories, romance and humour. I love variety which is why I called my blog Smorgasbord Invitation and you will find a wide range of subjects. You can find the whole story here.
Find out more at https://smorgasbordinvitation.wordpress.com/about-me/

What a wonderful coincidence…thanks Liz, Sherri will be stoked.. We did a week on the broads in the summer of 1974.. with a lassie collie that kept getting off our boat on to any other that was not moving… xxx

Yikes…my bad, so sorry Liz! I read your comment right, but re-reading my reply, I don’t know what the heck I was on about. Truly what I meant to say was I wonder if your other companion scared you as much as it did me…! I can only put it down to having had little sleep the night before, having just driven several hours home from London after a Metallica gig in London with my three adult children. I’m paying the price with vertigo…and a half-thinking brain!

LOL Deb and Sally!!! I don’t know about brave, more glutton for punishment I would say! I also used to read an Edgar Allen Poe horror book in bed at night in a creaky, cold 13th century house in the middle of the Suffolk countryside with foxs screaming in the distance. With a vivid imagination at the best of times, I still don’t know why, to this day, I did that, and I haven’t touched his stories since!!!! Thanks so much, Deb…glad you enjoyed the adventure, albeit it a spooky one lol! ❤ xxx

Thank you so much, once again, Sally, for featuring this, the last of my archive memoir posts. I’ve had an absolutely fantastic time hanging out with you and your wonderful readers and followers and it’s been interesting for me too, to re-visit these ‘old’ posts! I’ve been really humbled by all the lovely comments and interest, and your kindness in sharing so generously and extensively. I will reblog/post and share on Monday morning first thing, and will be back to visit you and Debbie here too with your latest Letters to America and Deb’s travel posts…meanwhile, have a super weekend. Big hugs! 🙂 ❤ xxx

You will love the Norfolk Broads, Charli! They are man made, originally peat bogs. Now they are an expanse of water and natural beauty revived by massive conservation efforts with ancient woodland, bird hides and nature walks on land, with rivers and lakes so clean now that water lillies grow once again and fresh water otters are back,not seen since the 70s. So many stories…one day, one day! 🙂 ❤ 🙂

Reblogged this on A View From My Summerhouse and commented:
Good Monday morning/afternoon,dear friends! Things have been busy at the Summerhouse these past few weeks, culminating with not one, but two trips to London in just the last week. All or nothing, it seems. The first, of course, to the Bloggers Bash and the second to see Metallica at the Twickenham Stadium with my boys. My first time at a real live gig and it was awesome, amazing, surreal…all of those and much more. Perfect timing then to wrap things up with a nice, relaxing boating holiday, albeit one from my 2014 archives. Massive and grateful thanks once again to lovely Sally Cronin and her wonderful Smorgasbord Blog Magazine for featuring the fourth and final of my archive memoir posts. I hope you’ll join me for this brief sojourn on the Norfolk Broads, but beware: a lake at sunset brings a ghostly tale, and a true one at that… Enjoy!

I’m glad the photo captures it to a degree, but I realise I never did write that post about it…the ghost story about it in that book is the scariest and eeriest one of all. Your ‘vast swathes of flat, desolate land’ is a wonderfully evocotavie and apt description. To think that once stood a thriving Abbey, the largest in England if I’m recalling correctly. And it was one of the few that wasn’t destroyed by King Henry VIII. I need to revist the history, it is fascinating.Thanks so much for reading over at Sally’s, Denise, always lovely to hear from you 🙂 xxx

What an adventuresome holiday, Sherri, reading ghost story at night on your boating trip. I used to listen to ghost stories on radio back in the days when we only had radio. I still remember some of the stories.
Thank you for the post, Sally! ❤

How brave of Sherri to read ghost stories. I haven’t read too many but they stay with me and the eeriness is not something I enjoy. The encounter with the mystery ship would have been a bit unnerving too. What a great post to revive. Thanks, Sally.

It’s an experience I nor my family will ever forget, Norah. Not only us adults, but seven children watched in silence as the ‘ghost ship’ sailed by in not a breath of wind. Truly eerie! Those stories stay with me, too…after a while, I had to stop reading them, but I think the damage was already done! So glad you enjoyed the post, thanks so much, Norah! 🙂 ,<3